Thursday, April 8, 2010

Quacks like a duck...

According to an article in Le Monde on March 25, the US Department of Energy "admits that 'a chance exists that we may experience a decline' of world liquid fuels production between 2011 and 2015 'if the investment is not there.'" This bombshell emerged in "an exclusive interview with Glen Sweetnam, main official expert on the oil market in the Obama administration."
The Le Monde article goes on: "The DoE dismisses the 'peak oil' theory, which assumes that world crude oil production should irreversibly decrease in a nearby future, in want of sufficient fresh oil reserves yet to be exploited. The Obama administration supports the alternative hypothesis of an 'undulating plateau.' Lauren Mayne, responsible for liquid fuel prospects at the DoE, explains : 'Once maximum world oil production is reached, that level will be approximately maintained for several years thereafter, creating an undulating plateau. After this plateau period, production will experience a decline.'"
In other words, we don't believe that world oil production will soon reach a maximum and begin to decline (the "peak oil theory"); instead, we believe that world oil production will reach a maximum, stay there for a few years, and then decline. That decline could commence as soon as next year.
Two comments: First, what's the difference? Is this just a way to announce Peak Oil without acknowledging it? The idea of the "undulating plateau" has been part of the Peak Oil discussion for years (see my book Powerdown), and world oil production has in fact been at a plateau since late 2004. Second, how is it that readers in France now know more about U.S. Department of Energy oil supply forecasts than Americans do? There has been no equivalent article in the mainstream press in North America.
It's time for the DoE to answer some tough questions. Too bad U.S. media outlets are evidently too timid, busy, or uninformed to bother themselves with the trivial business of alerting the American people to an impending calamity that is entirely foreseeable and that a few people in government are evidently willing to speak about (at least in code), if only someone asks.